The Zero Waste University Program in Mexico: A Model for Grassroots Innovations in Sustainability

Abstract

Grassroots innovations for sustainability can take various forms, including novel models for comprehensive waste management. This article examines the contributions of the University Solid Waste Management Program with a Zero Waste approach, a grassroots innovation established by the community of a university campus associated with a non-governmental organization. The program was developed in Cuernavaca, Mexico, in a political and economic context marked by unsustainable and inequitable practices, but with a long history of social struggle for the construction of alternatives. In analytical terms, we study the formation and mutual influence of the sustainability niches of both organizations from the perspective of strategic niche management theory, as well as the benefits resulting from such development.

Expanding Plastics Recycling Technologies: Chemical Aspects, Technology Status and Challenges

“…MSW commonly ends up in landfills and up to a third of the total waste is disposed of in open dumps. [128][129][130][131] Consequently, the prevailing situation is that the MSW management in Latin America is a focus of concern in terms of public health, environmental risks, informal economy, security and social inequality, particularly for the communities where the MSW transfer units and final disposal sites are located.…”

Expanding plastics recycling technologies: chemical aspects, technology status and challenges

“…Up to a third of MSW is disposed of in open dumps. [125][126][127][128] Consequently, the prevailing situation is that the MSW management in Latin America is a focus of concern in terms of public health, environmental risks, informal economy, security and social inequality, particularly for the communities where the MSW transfer units and final disposal sites are located.…”

Grassroots innovation and social innovation in perspective

“…Forty-one scientific papers were found with the concept of grassroots innovations (see methodology section B). The term most commonly used in the papers was grassroots innovations, abbreviated as (GI) or (GRI) ( Boni et al, 2018 ; Boyer, 2018 ; Hossain, 2018 ; Lin et al, 2018 ; Nicolosi et al, 2018 ; Singh et al, 2018 ; Marletto and Sillig, 2019 ; Ng et al, 2019 ; Belda-Miquel et al, 2020 ; Gupta, 2020 ; Jiménez-Martínez and García-Barrios, 2020 ; Pellicer-Sifres, 2020 ; Singh et al, 2020b ; Sillig, 2022 ). Other terms used in this search were grassroots movements ( Hossain, 2018 ), grassroots initiatives ( Grandadam et al, 2021 ; Kump and Fikar, 2021 ; Dana et al, 2021 ; Mehr et al, 2019 ), grassroots NGOs ( Farid, 2019 ); or emergent grassroots innovations ( Rasillo, 2021 ).…”

“…Other works use the same definition of grassroots innovation but establish a stronger link between grassroots innovation and the socio-technical transitions approach ( Pellicer-Sifres, 2020 ). They underline the characteristics of the origin of grassroots innovation, for example: grassroots innovation are originated by civil society, they are based on social experiments using innovative technologies, values or institutions ( Jiménez-Martínez and García-Barrios, 2020 ).…”